East Germany, 1975. Karin Müller, sidelined from the murder squad in Berlin, jumps at the chance to be sent south to Halle-Neustadt, where a pair of infant twins have gone missing.

But Müller soon finds her problems have followed her. Halle-Neustadt is a new town – the pride of the communist state – and she and her team are forbidden by the Stasi from publicising the disappearances, lest they tarnish the town’s flawless image.

Meanwhile, in the eerily nameless streets and tower blocks, a child snatcher lurks, and the clock is ticking to rescue the twins alive…

~*~

Set during the height of the Cold War and East Germany, under the control of the Stasi and communist influence, Stasi Wolf is the second in the Karin Müller series. Oberleutnant Müller, a member of the People’s Police, is sent to Halle-Neustadt to investigate the disappearance of infant twins. Forbidden by the Stasi to publicise the disappearance so the flawless image of Halle-Neustadt remains intact, Karin and her team run into a series of problems and roadblocks that prevent them from completing the job in a timely manner. As the months pass, the child snatcher hides in plain sight amongst the nameless streets, and a much larger mystery is lurking in the shadows of the missing twins.

The world of Stasi Wolf shows East Germany thirty years after the end of World War Two, under Soviet and Communist control. It is a world that Karin Müller has grown up in, and as a member of the People’s Police, struggles against doing what is right for the nation, what the Stasi demand, and working to resolve cases of missing children, at times having to use subversive methods to get by the watchful eye of the Stasi, especially Malkus, the Stasi officer in charge of Halle-Neustadt, vetting every move Karin and her team make in the search for the missing babies. It is a story full of twists and turns, that shows hints of the past at times, and these hints are slipped in effectively and in a way that keeps the reader guessing.

The development of Karin’s character is excellent too – from the hints at what happen to her during her training, to her family dynamic and the scenes that give the reader a glimpse into her past, and what made her the person she is in the novel, and the way she uses these past experiences to subvert the orders she is given. Her ability to find a way to bypass the orders shows that she is creative and innovative – as much as she can be in a Communist run state.

I thought that the suspense and pace of this book were well written. The scenes that flicked back and forth in first person held much mystery, and added to the thickening plot and case that Karin was investigating. Another nice surprise was the side story of Karin’s relationship with the doctor, Emil. It didn’t take over the rest of the story, and was effective, and tied in nicely with the eventual conclusion of the story. It is a gripping story that ensnared me and captured my attention, wanting to know what happened next, and what kind of person would kidnap twins, and why.

David Young has captured the characters well, and the hints he leaves about some of the characters creating a well-thought out sense of mystery, and his backdrop of the Stasi controlled East Germany ensured a story that had many twists and turns, and complex and flawed characters, in a world where knowing who to trust was hard. It was a great novel, and I hope the series will continue.